Lost Coin!

For Sunday, July 13, 2025:

Luke 15:8 AMPC: “What woman, having ten [silver] drachmas [each one equal to a day’s wages], if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and look carefully and diligently until she finds it?”

Jesus is teaching the mixed crowd – tax collectors, sinners, Pharisees and teachers of religious law – the parable of the lost coin. In today’s dollars, about $200 had gone missing, and if any of us lost $200, we’d certainly look until we found it! Note the ratio, 1 out of 10 missing. We’d check every dresser drawer and go through our purses and pants pockets. Is it time to clean out the car? Check every nook and cranny. The search wouldn’t be over until the sum was located!

In real life, something far more valuable than a coin had gone missing. In this parable, the lost coin represents the soul of a lost sinner. Heaven is patiently waiting for that sinner to repent and return, and heaven will not abandon that soul until they have had adequate chances to reconcile with the Creator. God’s desire is that none would be lost, and that all would repent and return!

When the sum is retrieved, the woman invites her neighbors in to celebrate the victory. “Rejoice with me because I have found my lost coin!”

Jesus summarizes his teaching: “In the same way, there is joy in the presence of God’s angels when even one sinner repents.”

You are extremely valuable to the Lord!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship

Everyone Matters to God

Feb. 17, 2014 Monday Message:

Luke 15 is filled with 3 similar parables: The Lost Sheep, The Lost Coin, and The Lost Son. Let’s look at the parallels.

In the Lost Sheep parable, the shepherd is God, and the lost sheep is us. In the Lost Coin, the woman represents God, and we are the lost coin. In the final story, the father is God, and you and I are the lost son.

Notice that what was missing in each story was something of great value. The shepherd, the woman and the father never stopped looking until what was lost was found again.

When the shepherd recovers the lost sheep, he calls his friends and neighbors to celebrate.

When the woman finds her lost coin, she calls her friends, saying, “Rejoice with me!”

When the father greets his wayward son, he orders the fatted calf butchered and the celebrating to begin. “This son of mine was dead and now has returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found!”

When what is lost becomes found, Jesus says it’s worthy of a celebration. One sinner repenting and returning puts heaven in party-mode. The Message says, “Count on it – that’s the kind of party God’s angels throw every time one lost soul turns to God.” (Luke 15:10)

So you can see the trend: People far from God really matter to God.

Norton Lawellin

Jesus in the City Fellowship (JICF) meets every Sunday, at 10:30am, in the North end (gym) of the Oliver Ministry Building, 2647 Bloomington Ave., Minneapolis. This week, the Temple leaders question Jesus’ authority to teach. Pastor Michael Pilla moves us into Luke 20:1-8. See you at church!